


Have You Heard about the Midnight Rambler?

by calrissian18



Series: this shouldn't even be here [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Dark, Explicit Language, M/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Thanksgiving, tumblr!fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-12
Updated: 2014-01-12
Packaged: 2018-01-08 11:45:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1132264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calrissian18/pseuds/calrissian18
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles wiggled his fingers, smiling – the left side of his mouth twitching up higher than the right.</p>
<p>Derek didn’t remember Stiles’ smile being uneven before.</p>
<p>“I think I killed something,” he said bemusedly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Have You Heard about the Midnight Rambler?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Emeraldawn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emeraldawn/gifts).



> Pt. 2 in the unrelated tumblr!fic series! I was having a brain-be-broke day so I asked my ~~nemesis~~ friend, emmy, to prompt me. Knowing I hate fluff with a MIGHTY vengeance, she gave me the prompt: "Derek having Thanksgiving (which was holiday appropriate at the time of original post *g*) at the Stilinskis'."
> 
> Knowing I had to ~~defeat her~~ write something, I happily found a way to make it dark as _balls_.
> 
> [Original post](http://wellhalesbells.tumblr.com/post/68508793497/i-need-to-palette-cleanse-because-i-am-being-massively).

“Stiles.”  Derek nudged him in the side with his boot, likely harder than he should’ve.  “Get up.”

Stiles’ eyelids fluttered but Derek stayed tense, arms crossed over his chest, knowing Stiles’ eyes being open didn’t necessarily mean he was aware of his surroundings.  Stiles snorted, expression  _cracked_ , the amusement on his face looking forced and malevolent.  This wasn’t the same boy Derek had known a year ago.  This was a different animal altogether.

He looked up at Derek with sunken eyes.  “He’ll leave his footprints up and down your hall,” he sing-songed under his breath and a shiver crawled up Derek’s spine.  Stiles lifted a hand to rub at his face.  He stopped just short of touching his fingers to his forehead.

And Derek saw why instantly.  They were covered in a sticky, dark blood.  The scent of it was so strong that Derek was amazed he hadn’t been knocked back by it immediately.

Stiles wiggled his fingers, smiling – the left side of his mouth twitching up higher than the right.

Derek didn’t remember Stiles’ smile being uneven before.

“I think I killed something,” he said bemusedly, not seeming fazed at all by the declaration.  He placed his bloody hand on the burnt floorboards of Derek’s old house and pushed himself up into a standing position.  He wriggled his toes against the debris, in nothing but loose pajama bottoms and a worn t-shirt.

Derek might’ve been surprised but he had found Stiles like this one too many times since he’d come back.

Stiles’ gaze zeroed in on the drops of blood that seemed to be coming from the back door and he followed them out, not caring about stepping in the fresh puddles.

Derek stalked behind him, giving Stiles a wide berth in case he wasn’t necessarily  _Stiles_.  It was getting harder to tell what was illusion and what was simply the newer, darker shape he’d been beaten into.

A dead deer had been dragged through the dirt, now churned and bloodied, right up to his back door.

Stiles turned around and smirked at him, eyes dark and feral.  “Venison.  Not quite holiday-appropriate,” he toed the deer and a few flies were shaken off it only to land again a second later, “it being turkey day and all.”  He shrugged.  “You should help me and my dad roast it or whatever the fuck you do with dead deer.”  He poked his head back inside, looking around Derek to stare at the hole in the floor where Peter had resurrected himself using Derek’s blood.  “Unless you planned to stay here, dine with your ghosts.  It would be very in character for you, I’ll admit.”

Derek didn’t ask how Stiles had known that had been the dining room.  He didn’t want to know.  He hadn’t realized it was Thanksgiving either, with Cora gone and Isaac officially Scott’s pack and Peter whatever the fuck Peter was, he had no one and no reason to keep track of those things now.

Stiles tilted his head to the side, smile stretching halfway up his face, a mockery of happiness rather than the real thing.  “You should come for my dad.”  Stiles’ eyes flashed oddly.  “It seems cruel to make him dine with the thing wearing his son’s face on this, our day of thanks.”

Derek swallowed, skin crawling, and reached out to grab Stiles by the front of his shirt.  It wasn’t the first time he’d thought about trying to  _shake_  him out of it.  It was the first time he’d actually come so close to doing it.  He pulled Stiles forward and his expression didn’t even twitch and Derek  _wanted_  to affect him.  He wanted to make him feel  _something_.

He dragged Stiles in and kissed him hard.

Maybe before… maybe then they could have had this.  He’d been too busy running from it to know. 

He gentled, lifting one hand from Stiles’ shirt to smooth it over his jaw and tilt his chin up, deepening the slot of their mouths while he fed Stiles his tongue, half-afraid of getting bitten.  But Stiles didn’t bite.  He clenched his fists into the shoulders of Derek’s jacket, pulling himself up or maybe pulling Derek down, as he kissed back with everything he had in him – most of which terrified Derek these days.

Derek pulled back and Stiles’ lips were swollen and red.  His eyes were soft, more golden than the muddy brown they’d been a minute before, and he blinked, a strange smile spreading over his mouth while he lowered his hands.  “This won’t save me, you know?”

Derek hitched up a shoulder, already missing the warmth of Stiles’ fingers curled over it.  He picked up Stiles’ hand, held it in his own.  “I know,” he said hoarsely, pretending Stiles squeezed back rather than letting his fingers hang limp in Derek’s grip, like he wasn’t sure what the gesture meant anymore.  Derek could mourn that or he could meet Stiles halfway in this darkness.

“Let’s get you home.  Your dad’ll be expecting you, and I have a deer to cook.”


End file.
